


Words Unwritten

by ssrhpurgatory



Category: Wolf 359 (Radio)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Regency, F/M, Identity Porn, Identity Reveal
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-12-27
Updated: 2018-12-27
Packaged: 2021-03-11 03:42:37
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 5,273
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28368594
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ssrhpurgatory/pseuds/ssrhpurgatory
Summary: The years that Aleksandr Valentin has spent corresponding with Mr. Reginald Epps, a member of the Royal Society and a brilliant chemist, have been some of the most productive of his career. And more than that, Mr. Epps has become a dear friend over those years... and perhaps more. Just how much more, Aleksandr longs to find out.But every time Aleksandr has suggested that he might travel to London to meet the man, Mr. Epps has turned him down... until finally, Aleksandr decides that he isn't going to take no for an answer any longer.Rosemary Epps has always had to live her life carefully. She knows that the careful fiction she maintains, of an older brother constrained by illness to remain in seclusion, is the only thing keeping her in charge of her own fortune and capable of carrying out the scientific research that brings her such joy. There's just one place she felt it safe to reveal more of herself than she ought to: in letters to Mr. Aleksandr Valentin, whose home in Saint Petersburg makes it unlikely that he would ever come searching for her.But now he has, and she will have to decide whether to keep hiding... or whether to destroy the fiction that protects her and reveal her heart.
Relationships: Alexander Hilbert/Original Female Character
Comments: 1
Kudos: 1





	1. Chapter 1

Aleksandr Valentin had traveled all the way from Saint Petersburg in search of Mr. Reginald Epps and the research he had been doing in the realm of chemistry, but now that Aleksandr was finally in England, he was having a hell of a time finding the man. He had spent so long thinking of the journey as the actual impediment that his inability to actually locate Mr. Epps now that he had arrived at the end of it had thrown him off balance. 

After his initial inquiries into the man’s address had borne no fruit, he had started, of course, with a meeting of the Royal Society, as they had been regularly publishing the findings of Mr. Epps. But despite the fact that Mr. Epps lived in London, it turned out that he had never once attended a meeting of the Royal Society.

“Is that not unusual?” Aleksandr found himself asking one of the gentlemen he had met there.

“Mr. Epps is a bit of a recluse,” the man had responded. “I've certainly never met the man.”

“Do you know anyone who has?”

There was some discussion among the gentlemen surrounding Aleksandr, and the conclusion they all came to was that they didn't know anyone who had… but a Captain Albert Bennett that a few of them were acquainted with had, once or twice, mentioned he knew the man’s half-sister. This left Aleksandr frowning. Mr. Epps had never mentioned a sister, half- or otherwise, in all of their correspondence.

Of course, when Aleksandr had suggested coming to England to meet Mr. Epps, the man had responded with a fervent negative, declaring that he was satisfied with a friendship based entirely on their correspondence by letter, so it seemed likely that there was much he did not know about his friend. After all, there must be some secret the man was wont to keep quiet that prevented such a meeting, must there not? And for all that Aleksandr had reassured the man that anything he might reveal about himself, no matter how great a secret, would not affect the friendship between them, Mr. Epps had insisted: there was no reason for them to meet.

“I do value your friendship a great deal,” the most recent letter had said, “but I worry that you would find me lacking, were we to meet in person. At the distance of nearly two thousand miles, I have the time and space to think my letters through and to give the impression of an intelligent and well-read individual, but I am afraid that in person, I cannot say the same. And I find I cannot bear the thought of your disappointment.”

Despite this discouragement, Aleksandr had given in to the irrational urge to travel all the way to England and find Mr. Epps. He had not given up when it turned out that the address he had been sending his letters to was a posting-house. He would not give up now.

“Perhaps one of you gentlemen could introduce me to Captain Bennett,” he said to the members of the Royal Society with whom he had acquainted himself.

They agreed that they could.

Aleksandr had not been sure what to expect from Captain Albert Bennett, but an army desk officer was not what he had anticipated. Particularly not one so large… or so ginger. The man had more than a foot on Aleksandr and the shoulders to match his height. And right now, he was glaring suspiciously across his desk at Aleksandr.

“What is it you want with Miss Epps, again?”

Aleksandr sighed and tried to explain again. “As I told you, it is not Miss Epps I am trying to find. It is her brother. I am simply hoping that she might be able to make the introduction.”

The glare grew sharper. “I thought you said you'd been corresponding with Mr. Epps. Surely if he wanted an introduction, you would already have it.”

Aleksandr felt his face flush. “I told him I wished to meet him. He… he said that there was no point in me traveling all this way.”

“And now that you have traveled all this way, has Mr. Epps changed his mind?”

“I sent a note to the address I had for him. There has been no response.” Aleksandr sighed. It had been more than a week.

“Well. There you are.” Captain Bennett straightened the papers on his desk, obviously dismissing Aleksandr. “If the man wished to meet you, he obviously would have by now. Looks as if you came all this way for nothing.”

“Perhaps… I understand he is a recluse. Perhaps if I could meet his sister… if she approved of me…” Aleksandr trailed off and sighed again. “No. Forgive me. You are right.”

Captain Bennett turned his piercing gaze on Aleksandr again. “Tell me, Mr. Valentin. Why do you want to meet Mr. Epps so badly that you would travel all the way from Russia with no encouragement?”

I am in love with him, Aleksandr considered saying. But no, that was too stark a truth, for all it was the truth, and had been for some years now. “Because… because nothing has mattered as much to me over the past five years as the letters Mr. Epps has sent. We have corresponded on scientific matters, yes, but also…” Aleksandr trailed off, feeling his face flush with embarrassment again. Captain Bennett had a knowing look on his face, and Aleksandr felt as if he might as well have admitted to what he had left unsaid.

“I'll talk to Miss Epps,” Captain Bennett said abruptly, breaking a long, awkward silence.

“Thank you,” Aleksandr said fervently, barely able to keep the relief in his voice under control.

Captain Bennett pierced him with one of those looks that seemed to cut right through Aleksandr’s facade. “Don’t thank me. You haven’t met the woman yet.”

Aleksandr tried not to find that ominous.

Rosemary set aside the notes she had been piecing together and turned to greet the man who had just been let into her sitting room by a maid. “Captain Bennett! To what do I owe the pleasure?”

He lowered himself carefully to a chair and set his cane against the side. “To what do you think you owe the pleasure, Rosie?” He sounded irritated about something.

“I really couldn’t say.”

“A mess got dumped on me this afternoon and I’ve got a fair idea it’s your fault, missie, so don’t act the innocent. Or are you going to deny using your brother’s name to keep up a correspondence with a Russian scientist?”

Rosemary frowned and turned her chair away from the desk. “A Russian? I haven’t been…” she trailed off. “Oh. Oh _no_. He came _here_?”

“He said he sent a note.”

“I didn’t receive it.” That was a lie. She had been expecting a letter from him, but when she had received a slim envelope instead of the packet of writing she usually received from Mr. Valentin… well, she had set it aside. She had thought that her continued refusals to meet the man in person had lead to him giving up the correspondence entirely, but rather than read those fatal words in his familiar spiky handwriting, she had hidden the envelope at the bottom of her desk drawer and tried to forget about it and the strange surge of pain its narrow dimensions sent through her.

Albert sighed and rubbed his hand over his face. “Publishing your research, you said. Keeping up scientific correspondence with your peers, you said. Those actions I could condone. But Rosie…”

“I know.”

“Dear Reg is a recluse for a reason, Rosemary.”

“Damn you, Albert, I _know_.” Rosemary bit her lower lip, feeling remarkably close to tears. She hadn’t meant for this to happen.

“Just tell me. Am I going to have any other foreign scientists showing up at my office door, looking for Mr. Reginald Epps?”

Rosemary shook her head. “No. He’s the only one where…” Where I broke my promise and let a person show beyond the scientist, she added mentally.

Albert sighed again. “Well, that’s a relief. I take it you’d like me to send him on his way?”

“You haven’t yet?”

“He asked me to make an introduction. He wants to meet you.”

Rosemary gave him a startled look. “Meet _me_? Why?”

“He seems to be hoping that he can get access to the reclusive brother if he makes a good impression on the sister.”

“Well. You should tell him that I refused to be the go-between for my brother and send him on his way, then.”

“And if I refuse to be the go-between for you?”

“You wouldn’t,” Rosemary said, horrified.

Albert gave her a sardonic look. “This is your mess to clean up, missie. It never should have landed in my lap to begin with, but now that it has…”

Rosemary sat very still for a long, quiet minute, full of a terrible longing that she struggled to suppress, and contemplated Albert across the length of her sitting room. He was right. This wasn’t his mess. And she _had_ broken her promise to him. “Very well. I will be at Lord Cutter’s masquerade this evening. Bring him. I’ll send him on his way myself.”

“Good girl.” Albert got up and left her alone with her thoughts, thoughts that all inevitably spiraled down to the same concern: the vain hope that she’d have the strength to face Aleksandr Valentin… and to send him away without revealing anything of herself.


	2. Chapter 2

“When you said that Miss Epps had agreed to meet me, I expected to be making a morning call, not…” Aleksandr looked around the crowded ballroom, full to the brim with men and women in masks and dominos and outlandish costumes of every sort.

“I did warn you what she was like,” Captain Bennett said, obviously ignoring the fact that he had done nothing of the sort, instead preferring to mutter ominous pronouncements.

“How will we find her?”

Captain Bennett laughed. “Oh, don't worry, she's easy to spot. If she doesn't find us first, that is.”

Aleksandr frowned, but pulled out his quizzing glass and scanned the ballroom, trying to decide if any of the women visible were unique enough to count as easy to spot. His perusal was met by a sea of women, young, old, and in-between, a startling number of whom seemed to be dressed as caricatures of dairy maids and shepherdesses, but no one of them caught his eye more than any other. “Perhaps if you told me in what way she stands out…”

“Oh, but what fun would that be?” a low, raspy female voice asked from somewhere in the vicinity of Aleksandr’s elbow. Aleksandr started and turned his head to look at who had joined them. And then, he had to stop himself from being startled all over again.

A fat and extremely buxom Black woman, so short she barely came up to his shoulder, had appeared at his side. She had not given in to the apparent fashion for ridiculous costumes; instead, she was wearing a simple dress in a pale purple, well-cut to display those curves of hers to their best advantage. She wore a mask that had obviously been dyed to match the whole ensemble and a high, feathery headdress perched on her dark curls, which had been twisted into a complicated-looking coiffure. She smiled up at him, her teeth very white against the warm brown of her skin in the dim lighting of the ballroom.

“I'll take him from here, Captain,” the woman said, her gaze fixed on Aleksandr. Aleksandr was vaguely aware of Captain Bennett bidding them both a pleasant evening, but his attention was on the woman in front of him.

“Miss Epps?” he asked, a hesitant search for confirmation. She was not at all what he had been expecting; dashingly fashionable and, he suspected, at least his age, if not older. Certainly old enough that it was a shock she was not yet married.

The woman’s mouth widened into another amused smile. “Now, now. Do you not know that recognizing someone is extremely poor manners at a masquerade? Until the unmasking, we are strangers to one another, sir.”

“We would be strangers to one another even still.” He had just met this woman, and already Aleksandr felt as if he were wrong footed in every action he had taken so far.

“Mm.” The woman tilted her head to one side and looked him up and down, a lazy perusal that seemed as if it ought to give the lie to the Miss that Captain Bennett had introduced her as. This was not the look of a woman unfamiliar with a man’s body, or with what lay under his clothing.

Just how was it that Captain Bennett knew this woman, anyway?

“Offer me your arm,” she said. Aleksandr held his arm out for her automatically, and she slid her hand into the crook of his elbow and lead him along the edge of the ballroom, to where several open doors revealed an outdoor balcony. She lead him through, and, when the balcony proved to be occupied by a number of other couples seeking fresh air, she took him along the length of it to a set of stairs that lead down into the garden.

Aleksandr froze on the top step. “This does not seem proper.”

Miss Epps shrugged, a little movement that rubbed the side of her bosom against his arm. “I'm old enough and wealthy enough that I can afford not to be overly concerned with propriety,” she said, giving his elbow a little tug.

Aleksandr stumbled a bit as he started down the stairs. “And do you often lure upstanding gentlemen to secluded corners to have your way with them?” he asked, bemused, as she lead him into the garden. She took him around a wall that seemed to serve no purpose other than being a decorative barrier, apparently familiar enough with the grounds to know that there was a bench on the other side, out of sight of the house. There, she sat, drawing him down onto the bench at her side.

“Only the handsome and mysterious ones,” came her smiling reply.

Aleksandr frowned. He might give her mysterious, as they knew nothing of one another, but he was not certain how to take the handsome. Not from the sister of the man he… the man he cared for. “Why are we here?”

“Captain Bennett says you wish to meet my brother. I wish to determine what sort of man you are before even considering an introduction. You must understand. My brother does not meet new people.” She said it in a final-sounding fashion that made Aleksandr sigh.

“We have been corresponding for five years. He must know by now what sort of man I am for himself.”

“But I do not, Mr. Valentin, and the fact that he has not chosen to meet you of his own accord does not speak well of your character.” Her tone of voice was tart and forthright, the sort of voice that could give any command and see it obeyed in an instant. It brought to mind the governess his older sisters had had when they were young, a fierce dragon of a woman who none of them had dared to disobey.

“So you are saying it is a lost cause,” Aleksandr said, suppressing another sigh.

Miss Epps’ mouth softened into an expression not quite like a smile. “Not exactly. But I would not give you false hope.”

Aleksandr nodded. “What do you wish to know of me?”

Over the next half an hour, or perhaps a bit longer, Miss Epps peppered him with questions. How did he live? What was his family situation? Where had his schooling happened? Who were his friends? What did he believe about this topic and that?

Somehow, along the way, they got on to the subject of his research, and Miss Epps offered up some remarkably thoughtful commentary, which lead into a more in-depth discussion. Aleksandr forgot that he was talking to a woman and just spoke as he would to any of his peers… until Miss Epps shifted in her seat, leaning towards him, a wide smile brightening the lower half of her face. Aleksandr came to a stuttering halt in the middle of his sentence, his eyes fixed on that smile and the display of bosom below it. “But I must be boring you,” he said weakly. “My apologies.”

“No apologies necessary,” Miss Epps said, shaking her head, sending the feathers that sprang out of her headdress bouncing. “I assist my brother in assembling his notes for publication, so I am well-versed in his research.”

“I see.” Aleksandr tried to be surprised, but over the course of her interrogation of him, she had proven to be well-read and intelligent, obviously to the same extent that her brother was, so he could not quite bring himself to feel any actual shock at such a statement.

She reached over and placed her right hand on his left, where he had rested it on the bench. “I… I'll speak to him,” she said hesitantly. “I'm not making any promises, mind you.”

Aleksandr let out a sigh of relief. “That is all I ask.”

Miss Epps gave him another smile, as hesitant as her voice had been, then stood. “We should return to the ballroom. Separately.”

Aleksandr frowned up at her from his seat on the bench. “Then you should return first.”

“Oh, no. I have a few things to prepare before I return.”

Aleksandr looked around, confused. “What could you possibly have to prepare?”

Miss Epps was chewing on her lower lip. “I've been missing from the ballroom for nearly an hour in the presence of a man who hasn't laid a finger on me, and I have a reputation as a woman too loose to consider marrying to maintain.” As she spoke, she reached up to her hair and carefully removed a single pin, then replaced it. A loose curl strayed out of her coiffure, followed by another as she repeated the action. “At the very least, I must look thoroughly kissed.”

“Ah, so I am to shoulder all of the blame while experiencing none of the enjoyment,” Aleksandr heard himself say. He frowned almost immediately. What was he thinking, flirting with Mr. Epps’ sister? If he were to kiss anyone… well, she was certainly not the one he had come here hoping to kiss. Not that he had any great hope that Mr. Epps felt the way that he himself did, but at least if he met the man…

Miss Epps was biting down on her upper lip now and was, to all appearances, attempting to stifle laughter. “If you wish to take the enjoyment as well as the blame, I certainly will not deny you the satisfaction,” she said, before sinking her teeth into her lower lip again. “But I assure you, I can do well enough on my own.”

“Come here,” he said, snagging her hand and pulling her close. She was so short that when he spread his legs and tugged her between them, her face was only a few inches above his, despite the fact that he was still sitting on the bench.

Her expression beneath the mask was curious, and as she released her full lower lip from between her teeth, her tongue darted out to moisten it. Aleksandr let out a low groan at the sight. How had he not realized how attractive he found this woman until just now?

Or perhaps it was no true attraction, and was instead simply the many months he had spent as of late with no company but his own hand making themselves known now that an offer for physical intimacy with another person was present.

There was only one way to find out, he decided. He slid his hand up her arm and around the back of her neck, drawing her mouth gently but insistently towards his own.

Miss Epps did not resist.

It was all Rosemary could do not to whimper and melt into Mr. Valentin’s lap as he brushed his mouth against hers, gently at first and then more firmly, teasing her lips apart. Instead, she braced her hands against his shoulders, trying to keep her elbows steady as his tongue darted out and slipped into her mouth. She sucked lightly on the tip of his tongue and he let out a groan, and the hand that had been gently caressing the loose curls at the nape of her neck pulled her down harder against him, forcing her mouth open against his. His other arm was looped around her waist, and as they continued kissing, he tugged her down into his lap, so that she was sitting on his right leg, her own legs still between his.

Rosemary hadn't meant to allow such an intimacy—standing between the man’s spread legs had been enough—but her knees had gone too weak to support her. So instead she ran light fingers through his hair and gave in to the urge to dishevel his beautifully knotted cravat.

The hand that had been behind her neck slid around front of her instead, the gentle friction of his glove tracing its way down the exposed expanse of her bosom. Rosemary let out a low moan and arched her back, pressing against him, completely willing in that moment to let him do whatever he wanted to do to her.

But at that, he broke the kiss, looking down at her, his expression strangely unreadable under the mask for all that it was a bright, moon-lit night. “Will that do?” he asked hoarsely, his fingers lingering at the edge of her bodice for a moment longer.

Rosemary didn't trust herself to respond, so she simply nodded and stood, then turned away to make her way back to the ballroom on her own.

By the time Albert intercepted her, just inside the doors to the balcony, she had regained her composure. He offered her his arm, and she rolled her eyes but took it. She always felt ridiculously tiny when she was side-by-side with him.

“Well, Rosie, have you done the deed?”

Rosemary considered lying, but knew Albert would ferret out the truth one way or another. “Not yet,” she sighed.

“Rosie.”

“I know. He…” she trailed off, and sighed again.

“Why haven’t you put an end to it, then?”

“I don’t know.” She did. She was mourning the end of her friendship, of her correspondence with a man she never should have met face-to-face. She had thought it was safe when she’d started. She had thought him too logical to travel all the way from Russia, just to meet a man who must be one among many correspondents and collaborators.

She had been wrong.

She had been wrong about how she felt as well; she had thought that the stab of pain she had felt when she thought he was bringing the correspondence to an end was simply because her collaborations with him had been remarkably productive, despite being done over such a distance. She hadn’t expected the sudden realization that had come over her, when he had pulled her close and kissed her.

Until that moment, she hadn’t realized that she was in love with him.

And now that she had realized it, she didn’t know what to do.


	3. Chapter 3

Aleksandr watched Miss Epps go, then cursed softly and slumped back on the bench. Well. No doubt she would report to her brother that his Russian correspondent had practically ravished her on a garden bench, and there would go any chance of meeting the man in person. Of…

Why had he kissed her like that? She was not the person he had come here for. She was not… but then, she had kissed him back…

The thought faded away into nothing, and Aleksandr leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees, removing the mask and setting it aside so that he could bury his face in his hands. He didn’t know how long he had been sitting there, trying to bring some order to the turmoil of his mind, when Captain Bennett appeared. He lowered himself carefully to the bench at Aleksandr’s side and rested his hands on his cane, looking side-long at Aleksandr.

“Miss Epps was wondering if you’d run into some sort of trouble,” the man said.

“I am…” Aleksandr trailed off and sighed. “I have not run into trouble.”

“Other than the woman herself, I gather.”

“Hm.”

They sat there in silence for a while.

“Should I call for the carriage?” Captain Bennett asked.

“That would be best.” Aleksandr picked the mask up and looked down at it with a frown. He did not even properly know what her face looked like, he realized suddenly. He had never kissed someone and not known what they looked like.

Captain Bennett clapped him heavily on the shoulder and levered himself back to his feet. “If you want to hide out here, it should be around front in fifteen minutes.”

“No. I will brave the ball once more.” Aleksandr returned the mask to his face and followed Captain Bennett back to the ballroom, making his way around the crowded edge of the room in the Captain’s wake, all the while avoiding the urge to search the ballroom for the tall purple feathers of Miss Epps’ headdress.

“You should pay her a morning call,” the Captain suggested once they were safely ensconced in his carriage, both of their masks removed once more.

“Should I?” Aleksandr’s response was distracted, still back in that garden with Miss Epps.

“It's only polite to do so after kissing a woman.”

Aleksandr shot Captain Bennett a startled look, and got a sardonic one in response.

“How did I know?”

“That is what I am wondering, yes.”

Captain Bennett looked him over and smirked. “Her subterfuge is pretty good, I'll admit. She knows exactly how to look well-kissed. But you, on the other hand… I sincerely doubt the same could be said of you.”

Aleksandr sighed. “No. It most certainly cannot.”

“So you'll pay her a morning call.” Captain Bennett’s tone brooked no argument.

“Very well,” Aleksandr said grimly, already dreading the ordeal such a call would certainly be. “Where does she live?”

“Just around the corner from Lord Cutter.”

Something about the way the captain said that caught Aleksandr’s ear. “Does her brother live there as well?”

“When he’s in town,” Captain Bennett said shortly.

No, not that then… perhaps Captain Bennett had been hinting at another matter. “Is Lord Cutter a relation…?”

“No. He’s… more of a patron.”

“Of Mr. Epps?”

The captain was uncharacteristically silent, but in his silence Aleksandr read a negation.

“Or of the miss?” Aleksandr ventured.

Captain Bennett’s eyebrow twitched upwards, barely visible in the dark carriage, a silent acknowledgement.

“ _Blyad_. She is… is she his…?”

“Lover?”

“I was going to say mistress.”

Captain Bennett let out a sigh and a little laugh. “Nothing so simple as that, I'm afraid.”

Aleksandr frowned. “I do not understand.”

Captain Bennett laughed again. “And nor should you.”

“But you disapprove of her relationship with him,” Aleksandr pressed.

“Oh, I can't say I've any right to,” Captain Bennett said laconically. “I'm as far in with Lord Cutter as she is.”

“That does not mean you have no right to disapprove.”

Captain Bennett sighed. “It's not disapproval so much as… as feeling that she would be living a better life, had she never met the man. Or if she could break away from him, marry some worthy fellow who has nothing at all to do with her life here. But as long as she remains…” he sighed again. “The man holds a vast amount of influence. It's hard to escape his grasp once you're in it.”

“I see.”

Captain Bennett was silent for the rest of the ride back to Aleksandr’s hotel, though he followed Aleksandr in and requested ink and paper from the clerk on duty in order to write Miss Epps’s address down. And then, with a nod, Captain Bennett was gone.

“Mr. Valentin to see you.”

Rosemary set a sheet of blotting paper over the letter she was writing and stood to greet her visitor. He set his hat aside on a chair before crossing the room and taking her hand in his, bending to brush a brief, impersonal kiss to the back of it… and then he backed away again, as if he could not bear to be near her.

Despite his caution, the kiss he had placed on her ungloved hand still managed to send a shiver down her spine, bringing back the memory of his lips on her own just the night before.

She forced a smile onto her face, reminding herself that she couldn't show this man how much he affected her. “Mr. Valentin. I'm afraid I have not yet had the chance to communicate your desires to my brother. He is…” Rosemary cast about for an excuse. “He is in the country.”

“I…” he looked lost for a moment, and then seemed to gather himself together. “I have come to visit you.”

Rosemary’s heart leapt in her chest, and she mentally scolded herself. “Oh? Whatever for?”

Mr. Valentin was blushing now. “Captain Bennett told me it was polite to pay a morning call to a woman after… after what passed between us in the garden,” he said stiffly, looking off to one side, obviously too uncomfortable to even look at her.

“You mean after you kissed me senseless,” Rosemary said drily. Oh, this was a poor start. A poor end, too. What a thing, to realize her love for this man after years of subterfuge and deception. A deception which would no doubt leave him hating her should he realize it.

Mr. Valentin looked up… and then his gaze fixed on her mouth. “Yes,” he said, and instead of stiff his voice was suddenly low and hoarse with longing.

Rosemary couldn't resist. And neither, it seemed, could Mr. Valentin. As she stepped back in close to him, he stood there, almost as still as a statue were it not for the swift, harsh breaths he was taking. And then she was in front of him again, bare inches between their bodies, and finally he met her eye.

Mr. Valentin looked directly at her, making no attempt to hide the lust in his gaze. He let out a soft sigh of breath as he studied her, and Rosemary could almost imagine she felt it feathering over her lips.

“I did not come here for this,” he said in a voice wracked with pain, his eyebrows drawing together in a frown. “I wanted… I hoped…”

Rosemary swallowed hard. “You fell in love with my brother,” she said softly, and read the answer in his expression. Of course. Of course he had. If she loved him from his letters, why should he not feel the same way about hers?

But they were not her letters. Oh, she had written them, and every word, every theory espoused, every secret feeling revealed was hers… but the name, oh, the name. Every letter signed by Mr. Reginald Epps, a necessary deception that she resented now more than ever.

“I won't tell him about this if you don't,” Rosemary whispered. And then she slid her arms up around his neck and pulled him gently closer.

Mr. Valentin did not resist, and when his lips met hers, she felt his sigh of relief.


End file.
